I’ve noticed that there is a tendency to label a toddler as naughty even when he is just exhibiting characteristics that are normal for any developing child.  A toddler’s intense curiosity is a normal part of his drive to help him learn about the world around him.  Sometimes that intense curiosity drives him to do things that are annoying or irritating to us, especially when we’ve told him not to do it at least ten times before.  We then tell him off for being naughty when he isn’t trying to be naughty but when he’s just being a toddler who is curious to learn.

Before I go on, let me get one thing straight, this post isn’t about allowing a toddler to do whatever he fancies, it is about how you correct his behaviour.  For instance, toddlers are also intensely curious about plug points but that doesn’t mean we should allow them to stick their saliva-coated fingers into one.  Likewise there are things that a toddler will try to do that you should allow in order to help him develop his skills - like when he wants to pour water between his bowl and cup (if you don’t like the mess, get him to do it in the bath).  Or when he wants to climb the stairs but we can’t be bothered to follow him so we discourage him from doing so (yes, I’ve been guilty of this one) and then get annoyed with him when he insists on continuing.

To me, the definition of being naughty is when you specifically tell your child not to do something and then he looks you straight in the eye and does it defiantly.  However, this shouldn’t be confused with the times when a child does something you told him not to do yesterday.  Children have remarkably short memories and they do need constant reminders before they can remember not to do something in future.  For instance, I used to have to remind Gavin on a daily basis not to go near the plug points, but now I’ve noticed that he can play in an area near a plug point and remember that he isn’t supposed to touch it.

The problem with telling a child that he is naughty because he wants to open the kitchen drawers or climb the door frames (yes, I did that when I was a kid) is that you are squashing his instincts to learn.  There are things that are negotiable and then there are the actions that are not negotiable.  Obviously plug points and running onto the road are not negotiable.  In such instances, what you should do is teach him why you don’t want him to do it, for example, when it is dangerous.  Although he may not grasp the concept immediately, he will eventually learn why it is dangerous.   

With actions and activities that are negotiable, you can supervise his actions to make sure he doesn’t do anything that could hurt himself or damage your things.  It’s okay to say “no” when the timing is bad - for instance, when he wants to climb the stairs but you need to cook dinner - but it is important to let him know why he can’t do it right now.  At the end of the day, what you want to do is preserve your child’s curiosity to learn, at the same time setting firm boundaries that will help keep him (or others) safe from harm.

Nowadays, I try to dispense with the word “naughty”.  Instead, when he does something I don’t like, I tell him it is “not nice”.  Occasionally, the wrong word slips out (I think because it is so ingrained in me), but I’m getting better at it.  Similarly, I try not to say “clever boy” or “smart boy”, instead, I say “great job” or “good effort”.  The key is to focus on the actions and the behaviour rather than the child, regardless of whether you’re telling him off for doing the wrong thing or praising him for doing the right thing.

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For all the difficult times we go through with our toddlers, inevitably, there will be some good days that make us feel proud to be the parent of our child.  During such instances, I think it is a parent’s duty to stop and celebrate our child’s achievements so we don’t lose sight of the good things in our children when the trying times threaten to overwhelm us.

Yesterday, I took Gavin out to meet a friend of mine who is back from Russia for her Summer holidays.  We arrived early at 1Utama, so Gavin and I went browsing through the stores.  Fairly early on, Gavin spotted Starbucks and started pointing to indicate he wanted a hot chocolate.  I obliged and when I was getting the straw, he wanted one. 

After giving him the straw, I prompted him with, “What must you say?”

He immediately signed, “Thank you.”

Previously, whenever I wanted him to sign, “Please” or “Thank you” I would have to ask him to sign the words.  This was the first time he signed without being asked directly to sign the word.

I told him we were going to have lunch with my friend, V, and though he initially balked at the highchair, he later volunteered to sit in it on his own when V arrived.  During our entire lunch, Gavin sat patiently in his chair, feeding himself and entertaining himself.  He didn’t fuss and he didn’t interrupt our conversation.  It wasn’t until I finished eating that he wanted to get out of the chair to walk, to which he said, “Walk walk,” although it sounded more like “wok wok”.  He later signed “walk” as we were walking to the bathroom.

I was also pleased with his display of manners towards V.  When she was holding his water bottle, he signed, “please”.  V asked me what he was doing and I told her he was saying, “Please can I have my bottle back?” After she handed the bottle back to him, he signed, “Thank you.”  He did it all on his own without me having to prompt him.

As usual, he caught the attention of the waitresses who all remembered him from the days when my parents and I used to have lunch there.  And as usual, he was his charming self - smiling, waving, shaking hands, giving high 5s and blowing kisses.

I couldn’t have been prouder of how admirably he behaved.

Above: V, Gavin and me.

Above: Gavin, V’s friend and V.

Above: V and Gavin.

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Ever since the hubby and I talked about getting our own house, I’ve been thinking about getting teak patio furniture to go with my Japanese style garden.  Having grown up in Melbourne where gardens are such a large part of what makes up a home, I can’t imagine Gavin growing up in a home without a garden.  In my younger days, I have always felt that when I had kids, I would love a house with a garden that my kids could run around and play in just like the one I had when I was growing up.

Over the past few weekends, we’ve been checking out display homes for ideas.  I like the idea of getting teak outdoor furniture because I like the wood finish and teak is hardy enough to withstand the humid tropical elements in this part of the world. 

My ideal garden would be one with a cubby house for my kids to play in while I lounged on our teak furniture and read a book or worked from my laptop on the patio.  That way I could keep an eye on the kids while catching up on some reading, emails or blogging at the same time.  Now that’s the life!

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When I first introduced the toothbrush to Gavin, he loved it.  He loved putting it into his mouth and chewing on the bristles.  I encouraged him to use his toothbrush while I brushed my teeth at the same time.  After I was done, I would help him clean his teeth properly either with the brush or with a wet cloth. 

Being so young, I was reluctant to introduce toothpaste to him because most of the children’s toothpastes we have in the market all contain fluoride.  Granted it is only 500ppm (half the concentration of adult’s toothpaste), knowing that young children don’t know how to spit out properly and usually end up swallowing everything you put into their mouths, I wasn’t keen to use toothpaste.

Don’t get me wrong - fluoride is great.  Fluoride was key in reducing tooth decay in the majority of the population and is the very reason why I remain decay free today.  Unfortunately, fluoride in large concentrations can cause fluorosis - white flecks on teeth in its mildest form all the way to severe brown mottling.  Since children have a habit of swallowing toothpaste, it is easy for them to exceed the optimal fluoride levels, especially because of their small mass.

It wasn’t long before Gavin caught on to the fact that I would apply toothpaste on my brush but not his.  At this age, Gavin likes to mimic our actions and he would follow us as precisely as he is able, so he started insisting I add paste onto his brush, too.

Not wanting to use adult toothpaste, I went hunting around for children’s toothpaste.  At Guardian, I noticed that there are four main options when it comes to children’s toothpastes:

• Colgate
• Oral B
• Darlie
• Kodomo

All of them contain 500ppm fluoride.  All of them come in fruity-flavoured variants (which I completely disagree with because the fruity flavours only serve to encourage a child to eat the toothpaste rather than spit it out).  In the end, I chose Kodomo for the following reason:

It contains xylitol.

What’s Xylitol?

“Xylitol occurs naturally in many fruits and vegetables and is even produced by the human body during normal metabolism. Produced commercially from plants such as birch and other hard wood trees and fibrous vegetation, xylitol has the same sweetness and bulk as sucrose with one-third fewer calories and no unpleasant aftertaste. It quickly dissolves and produces a cooling sensation in the mouth.”

Why Xylitol?

When I was in Uni, we had a lecture about sugar-substitutes, although our examination of such options were not so much about the calories about from a caries (tooth decay) benefits point of view.

Of all the sugar substitutes we covered Xylitol proved to be the most promising because it was not only found to be safe for consumption in large quantities, but it was also discovered to be anti-cariogenic.  In other words, it could reverse early formation of tooth decay in teeth. 

With such promise, I was surprised that it had not appeared in food as a sugar substitute at the time (this was in 1995, by the way).  It was only over the last five years that I have noticed xylitol appearing as a sugar substitute in chewing gum and only recently in toothpastes.

So far, Kodomo is the only toothpaste I have seen containing Xylitol, and that is why I recommend it.

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I was chatting with one of my Mummy friends recently and she mentioned that she had just attended her old high school reunion and that it was so amazing how everyone had changed.  I wonder if it is just parenthood that makes one curious about how everyone else is doing now because it has been a long time since I last thought about my old school mates.  I’m not referring to the ones I’m still in contact with but the others - the popular girls and boys, the secret crushes, the nerds…  I wonder how life is treating them?

They say a lot changes when you leave school and enter the workforce.  Something about working can really change a person so much that many highschool sweethearts often find themselves no longer as compatible as they once were during their school days.  I remember watching Jennifer Garner in a romantic comedy flick called, “Thirty Something” and in it, the popular school jock ended up as a cab driver and her chubby, nerdy, best friend turned into superhunk. 

Being one of those Hollywood movies, it’s hard to imagine that this could ever happen in real life until I start to reflect on the past ten years of my life…  A school nerd, myself, I was totally hopeless at sports.  Since I left school, I’ve run a marathon, climbed a route graded a 7A according to the French rock climbing grades, gone camping where I dug my own toilet - even my ex-boyfriend could hardly believe I did those things when we met again several years back.  If my life had changed so much, how had everyone else’s changed?

Some time back, I joined this social networking platform called Facebook.  Although I had heard about it for some time, I never bothered to join because I was already a member of a few other social networking sites and the thought of maintaining yet another site just seemed like too much work.  After hearing about the number of people that were hooked on Facebook, I guess curiosity got the better of me and I just had to take a peek for myself.  In my first week of Facebook, I think I hardly did anything else.  I found so many “old friends”, it was amazing.  Suddenly, I understood what the real attraction of Facebook was.  It was the chance to get back in touch with people you could never have hoped to find again.

Indeed, the internet is an amazing tool for finding lost contacts.  There are plenty of websites that offer similar services.  One in particular that I came across recently is called “Only Alumni”.  Aside from the usual groups like the Harvard Alumni, or just US specific groups like the Santa Barbara Alumni and the Florida State Alumni Group, I was surprised to find my ex-company among the many hundreds of groups in their listing.  If you can’t find your college among the list, you can make a request to have it added.

Unlike Facebook, which is cluttered by a lot of other meaningless activities, Only Alumni is focussed on maintaining contacts and networking.  You can join various groups regardless of whether you have previously been a member, a current active member or if you are a potential future member.  For instance, if you are currently evaluating employment with a particular company, you could even find out information about working in that company at Only Alumni. 

Only Alumni allows you to make comments, add events, invite friends, and keep your own blog.  The features are simple and clean, making it a pretty friendly platform to use.  If you’re worried about your details being too readily available to any stranger on the internet, you can rest easy because only registered members can access the groups.  You can also adjust your profile settings to protect your identity. 

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Gavin’s education has always been paramount in my mind.  Although the hubby and I have joked on several occasions that it would not be necessary for Gavin to excel on an academic level if he were to become a professional golfer, I would still like my son to be adequately equipped to handle whatever life dishes out to him.  My parenting style for Gavin is probably nothing at all like what I thought it would have been before Gavin was born.  I guess having Gavin physically in my arms has altered my perspective on a lot of my preconceived ideas of being a Mum.  If the old me were to meet the mother that I am today, I’m sure I would have considered some of my current practices radical, excessive and probably over the top.  But now that I am a mother to Gavin, I think the extra effort required of me has been completely worth it.

Although Gavin has only just turned one, the hubby and I have been forced to start thinking about his education and schools because a lot of the more popular schools these days have extremely long waiting lists.  Some parents place their children on the waiting list from as early as one year old! 

Since this part of the world happens to be the hubby’s territory, he has been the one making most of the suggestions about which schools Gavin should attend.  Personally, with the way I see a lot of school children behaving these days, I almost wonder if it would be better to have Gavin homeschooled.  Of course there are pros and cons to homeschooling but in recent times, such a practice is not longer as radical or old-school as it might once have been.

For parents interested in homeschooling, there are plenty of resources available to help you along.  The Southern Baptist Academy Homeschool is one place you can get information to help you get started and help you keep going.  So even if you don’t have any teaching qualifications, you can follow their programs and use the materials they offer including CD-ROMS, videos, audio files, web pages, and traditional print materials.  They pride themselves in offering a teaching program that is suitable for all children, even those who have specials needs.

The only thing that bothers me about homeschooling is the lack of interaction Gavin will have with other children his age.  The hubby is also keen for Gavin to attend a good school purely for networking purposes and you can’t get that if you’re homeschooled.  Even with the best educational program, I don’t think you can get by without networking these days. 

Regardless of what you decide, it is still worth checking out The Southern Baptist Academy Homeschool just to see what it’s all about.

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I came across an interesting site called Mamasource.  It is a local resource for Mums with the usual theme of Mums helping Mums.  From what little I’ve browsed through, it looks like a pretty handy site if you are a new Mum looking for advice and support.  It is also a handy place for you to locate local facilities for your children, from childcare to clubs and groups.  They cover a broad range of topics related to pregnancy, parenting and motherhood, but they also cover other activities that Mums would love, like shopping, beauty and fitness, and pets.

Membership is free so you can join to make friends, get help, or offer help.  What more could you ask for except for membership for non-US residents.  Unfortunately, they require a zip code when joining so if you don’t live in the States, I’m afraid the resource isn’t available to you.  What a shame.  Although the local resources won’t be too helpful if you don’t live in the US, I’m sure the other topics such as health and medical, pregnancy, and breastfeeding, etc. would still come in handy regardless of whatever part of the world you are from.

Perhaps Mamasource could consider opening their membership to Mums from other countries?

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The things you learn after planning a party for a baby…

1. A balloon pump is an essential investment, unless you want a good exercise for your lungs…  As I discovered the hard way - an air mattress pump doesn’t have sufficient blowing power to pump up a balloon.  So while Gavin happily chased after the growing pile of balloons we amassed…

…having a gala time while he was at it…

…Mummy and Daddy got to work using lung power to blow up forty balloons for his party.  Times like those, I’m glad I didn’t go overboard with the balloons and buy more, though I had been contemplating it.

Thank God for the hired help:

2. It is really handy having a chef for a SIL because that solves the problem of the birthday cake.  Bumblebees for the bumblebee theme:

The bee hive:

First layer of decorations:

A little more colour (although the hubby wasn’t too keen on the flowers for his son):

So my SIL used blue for the writing:

The bee hive surrounded by little hives:

A closer view of the cupcakes decorated the night before:

3. A house party is great especially when you have lots of babies attending.  Guests with young babies can nurse their babies, or hide out in a room when the baby needs to sleep.

The first birthday is usually the biggest do.  I think next year, we’ll have a smaller party and invite just Gavin’s friends.  Since he’ll be more clued in by then, I’m sure he’ll be a more sociable host.  Instead of crawling away from all his friends, he might actually interact with them.

So what’s the theme for next year?  Let’s see what preferences Gavin develops in the coming year…

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Firstly, I want to say Happy New Year!  Sadly, there were no countdowns for me this year.  Hubby fell asleep half an hour before the countdown and Gavin was asleep long before the night had even begun, although he continued to wake up for brief spells and had another night terror which rendered him almost inconsolable.  

So this was my rather uneventful New Year’s Eve:

1. Dinner with hubby, in laws and Gavin. 
2. Bath time for Gavin.
3. Clean up.
4. Rock and nurse Gavin to sleep.
5. Read chapter 1 of the last Harry Potter book - “Deathly Hallows”
6. Wrote a couple of blog entries.
7. Watched a movie with the hubby.
8. Listened to the neighbours counting down and cringed at the sound of the fireworks, hoping it wouldn’t wake the baby.
9. Exchanged “Happy New Year” greetings online with my BFF CS.

With the new year comes new resolutions and these are my resolutions:

1. Work on my health and fitness - for busy Moms, check out Go Workout Mom for some handy tips.
2. Work on my work-at-home project - Internet Home Businesses.
3. Get through my reading list.
4. Start Gavin on regular playdates or activity classes.
5. Start taking Gavin to a playground (when he can walk on his own).
6. Learn Hokkien.

Hmmm… that’s about all I can think of for now…

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I often like to take Gavin out on my own.  Being able to spend quality time where it is just the two of us is one of my most treasured passtimes with Gavin.  There is only one difficulty I face with such outings - going to the toilet.  Since Gavin isn’t able to stand unsupported, I don’t really have anywhere to put him while I use the toilet.  Gavin doesn’t like sitting in his pram, so I have long foregone the hassle of taking the pram out with us.  It seemed rather pointless to lug a pram around only to have to push it around while I carried Gavin in a baby wrap.  Even if I did have a pram, it wouldn’t fit into any of the toilet cubicles which still wouldn’t solve my toilet dilemma.

It would be so nice if someone would just design a chair with a harness so that Gavin would have a place to sit while I use the toilet.  This thought has often passed through my mind and as if someone were reading my mind, guess what I saw in the mother and child cubicle in a 1Utama ladies’ toilet recently?

Yup, you guessed it.  A built-in baby chair with a harness:

All I can say is: it’s about time!

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